1 down, 5 to go! This was the beginning of the scariest journey of my life. And it was already a very scary start. The side effects didn't kick in straight away. In fact, I was told by many people that the first three days were the hardest. So during the first two days I was anxiously waiting for something to happen . And so far, I felt ok other than the fact that I was tired with a loss of apetite. I thought that I could carry on with my life but boy oh boy did I completely underestimate the impact of chemo.
When day 3 came, I was completely wiped out. The side effects kicked in. I felt extremely exhausted
to the point that I couldn't leave the bed. I couldn't even walk from the bed to the bathroom without the support of my parents. Stomachaches kicked in and that lasted the entire morning. This stomach pain occurred over a couple of days. I also had mouth sores but I managed to eat a bit despite the lack of apetite. My oncologist prescribed me with this special mouth wash to minimize the mouth sores. Because I had trouble with eating or drinking anything at that time, I bought some protein drinks from the pharmacy to make up for the lack of nutrients. I also noticed a change in my appetite. I practically became a vegetarian because the thought and smell of meat made me sick. In fact, I nearly vomitted after trying chicken porridge. I felt like a pregnant lady lol.
Apart from the physical sensation, I also experienced brain fog also known as "chemo brain." This is a term coined by many cancer patients to explain the cognitive impairments as a result of chemo. For me, it affected my language ability- like I struggled to search for the right words and formulate a proper sentence . My mind was fuzzy. I had difficulty recalling things. My sleep cycle was out of sync. During those difficult nights, I was sitting up, walking around, going to the bathroom, returning back to the bed over and over again. It was very weird and frustrating.
One morning, my mum decided to measure my temperature and it turns out that I caught fever. My eyes were also slightly yellow so we immediately drove to my doctor where he conducted some blood tests. It turns out that my liver wasn't functioning properly and there was a risk of liver failure. My immune system was very low. According to my doctor, the ideal healthy white blood count should be atleast 3.6 and anything below 1.0 puts you at a high risk of infections. Apparently my blood count was around 0.7. I was given a neulasta shot in order to boost my white blood count. After a couple of days, I felt much better and my white blood count went up to around 4.0. I was also given some antibiotics to combat my fever. When I started taking these antibiotics, I was sweating over the next few nights and my temperature dropped down to 35 degrees. I was sweating so much that I had to change my tops three times. Despite the change of dried clothes, my entire bed was soaking wet. After a while, my body recovered.
It took me a total of 10 days to fully recover. It was an awful experience. Even though this chemo was a total shit show, I was pleased that I was able to breathe like a normal person again. In a way, it was reassuring to know that the chemo was working. If I had to rate my overall experience for this round from a scale of 1-10, I would give it a 2.5/10.
Comments